Just a slight correction there, 16 months cannot be slightly less then a year. Unless we're talking Alien planet years. And it's interesting to see
the development. I looked the star system up on these coordinates 19h 16m 52.2s +47° 53′ 4.2″ on wikisky and it seems there's at least a star
there. I guess that's how our solar system with Sol looks like when viewed from afar.

Originally posted by muzzleflash
Our sun is a "G2V" classed star, a "Yellow Dwarf". By "twin" they probably mean that it is similarly classed.

A G-type main-sequence star (G V), often (and imprecisely) called a yellow dwarf, is a main-sequence star of spectral type G and luminosity class
V.

Other G V stars include Alpha Centauri A, Tau Ceti, and 51 Pegasi.

This is actually sweet because it shows how commonplace planets similar to our own actually are. If we have found one already that means there are
hundreds of thousands to millions of planets like this in our own galaxy.

And who knows how many are like this in other galaxies, perhaps countless.

Very very good news.

edit on 5-12-2011 by muzzleflash because: (no reason given)

it hurts my brain to think that it's possible for there to be a billion earthlike planets, base minimum in this galaxy alone.

that puts the estimate at a trillion earth like planets with ease in our local group alone...

with the probability leaning towards a lot of them having technological abilties much like our own, its safe to say,
we are not alone out there!!!

No it's a billion suns like ours that are out there in our galaxy and that doesn't mean that every one will have planets like ours in orbit around
them.

What people don't realise is that though this planet is relatively close, they've still found a needle in a haystack just by finding it. It does not
mean the every second star system is going to have planets in the habitable zone and it doesn't mean that every planet in a habitable zone will have
the millions of other things needed to make the planets habitable. But if this pans out they've done very well indeed.

Originally posted by flexy123
Chances are 90000% that the "other" race is smarter than us...so i don't think it will be that easy to "colonize" them

Look around what a
stupid race humans are...we cant even live right on our own planet...

Intelligence does not necessarily equate to wisdom. Humans are very intelligent (or capable of it), but most aren't very wise or discerning. The
same could be true about extraterrestrial beings. They might be greatly advanced and highly intelligent, but that doesn't mean they are very wise or
discerning. Intelligence is only a tool to be used in conjunction with many other tools. One can be both smart and lazy or even so intelligent they
have become conceited, and thus are not necessarily acting in a very wise manner.

Intelligence is far from the only factor necessary to become advanced, and it is also not the only factor which makes one good or bad (for lack of
better terms).

Another thing, which never seems to be considered by those proposing life in other worlds, is that becoming more advanced and being more intelligent
does not necessarily mean extraterrestrial beings would have any desire to go off-planet. Maybe the more intelligent and wise one becomes, the more
they realize living simple is the superior life, and they are a civilization billions of years old which look more like the pioneer days of America
than Buck Rogers?

All I am saying is that you got to have ambition too. We assume that intelligence equates to ambition, but we could be wrong, there may be a point at
which intelligence becomes so great that ambition falls to the wayside, or at least ambition towards certain things. We also assume that the sort of
intelligence we are familiar with is the only sort out there.

We make lots of assumptions in our calculations concerning life (and particularly intelligent life) on other worlds, and such assumptions may not be
justified. One big one which comes to mind is that we assume advanced and intelligent means peaceful, and I don't think we have any evidence to
support that, in fact, if our own world is any indicator, we should probably stay away from extraterrestrials as they would likely be warmongers,
abusers, users, and destroyers. After all, it wasn't stupid people who invented warfare, bombs, guns, and other things to kill and maim with.

Just a slight correction there, 16 months cannot be slightly less then a year. Unless we're talking Alien planet years. And it's interesting to see
the development. I looked the star system up on these coordinates 19h 16m 52.2s +47° 53′ 4.2″ on wikisky and it seems there's at least a star
there. I guess that's how our solar system with Sol looks like when viewed from afar.

I appreciate your input, unfortunately you must have misread, as I said, "slightly less than a year and a half," which would be correct.

just because your not interested in finding out how common or rare earth-like planets are doesn't mean everyone else thinks the same.

human beings have looked up at the stars for thousands of years and speculated if there are other planets like ours. Now we are starting to find out,
with real data and hard facts. I guess some people just don't have an interest in the wider cosmos, what our place is and if we are alone or
not.

There is no possible way to communicate with anyone there, if there is anyone there, with our current technology. Given that we have not been
officially contacted by any intelligent ETs (face it, if they wanted to contact us, no governmental effort could stop them) I think it's safe to
assume any nearby (within... 1,000 lightyears) species are no more advanced than us, or maybe barely so. If there was a space-faring race within 1,000
lightyears (and probably much further) of us, we would have knowledge of them.

There are other theories to consider, too. Perhaps any advanced civilizations wiped themselves out before we even got a chance to meet. Or maybe we
did meet, thousands of years ago (ancient astronaut theory) but they have moved on in the universe. Or wiped themselves out years later. So many
possibilities, but none of them include interacting with any aliens in our lifetimes.

Edit: If possible, I would sign up to be put into a cryogenic state after my death and sent towards Kepler-22b on an unmanned craft. By the time I
arrive, humans and/or the natives of the planet should already be a Class II or III civilization and would be able to intercept me or meet me at
Kepler-22b and reanimate my body (if my craft made it there intact).

Great! Science continually destroys its own stated position that UFOs are not anything real. Of course, you debunkers will not see a direct
connection, so let me make it plain. If you lived in a fog-shrouded house, you could rightly say from your perspective that you had no neighbors
because you didn't see any.

Along comes an increasingly strong wind called Science. The air begins to clear. You see more and more of the neighborhood, house after house
appears. Some look amazingly like yours. They must be acknowleddged because you can no longer deny them.

At some point, you realized that the rare glimpses that you had over the years of (apparently) impossible sightings of other people walkng around past
your house were not your imagination but merely glimpse of life as it really is all around you.

Seeing is believing, but the mind may disallow your senses if it feels threatened in its beliefs.

Well I used "Dark side of the moon" both as a fact and metaphor. I know we have photos of the darkside of the moon. but no named areas. I you look
at a lunar map like the on my father had as a young man. the side we see every night has many know land marks. Sea of Tranquility or Mt. Maryilin ect.
the dark side of the moon has next to NO known named areas (other than grid 1234 ect)

The big arguement I never made last night (booze will do that to me

) was that why is it we worry about a planet thats 600 light years away,
when the people on earth are hungry and homeless. We may NEVER colonize deepspace just because of the vast distances. We need to hold Earth in the
highest regards, and besides I just have a feeling this is more fluff filler for Project Bluebeam or whatever with a fake alien invasion.

Yeah but without a moon stabilizing it's axis, the ``living part`` of that planet changes every few dozens millions of years... like one day it's
hot at the equator and 50 million years later, it's as cold as Antarctica...

So maybe like can adapt to these conditions, but it would make it much harder...

Am I the only one who thinks the search and finding of planets similar to earth and possibly capable of supporting life is absolutely fascinating,
regardless of whether we could ever reach it or make contact with any possible ET from said planet? Sure, the idea of of someday encountering ET
or discovering the physics and technology to travels lightyears, discovery of wormholes, etc. is awesome to think about in its own right, but I feel
completely exhilarated by each new cosmic discovery simply because it's a mind#, a slap in the face to humanoid-centric perspective. Plus, I have a
daughter, and someday she will probably have children and (assuming humanity survives), maybe her children's grandchildren will live to see the day!!
That's one hell of a thought to me.

No matter how bad things are on this planet, I will never think space exploration is a waste. Not because we need to hurry and find a new planet to
conquer/colonize, but more because the study of how tiny we are is a humbling dose of humility that we as humans are in desperate need of whether or
not we know it. (Plus it's just really really cool to think about! I can't think of anything more exciting that all of the secrets lurking out
there!)

I agree with you 100%! Anytime there's a new cosmic discovery, I almost wet my pants with excitement. I think space exploration deserves more credit
and attention than it currently has. So when people quarrel over the semantics or say, "Yeah, but there's no way we can get there, so it sucks and
doesn't mean anything," my jaw drops to the floor. How can anyone not find the cosmos fascinating?

I, personally, can't wait to see what the future holds for space exploration. It wasn't that long ago that we started exploring the cosmos and look
where we are now with our understanding of the universe (albeit still extremely primitive, comparatively)! Just think, with our fast paced growth in
technology and ever-changing understanding of physics what we'll be able find and explore in the near future!

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